Shadows
by RFDN
Summary: What if Ron wasn't Harry's first friend his age? What if his friend was similar to him? What if his friend pushed him to succeed? Grey Harry. M rating for torture. Don't own Harry Potter.
1. The Sun's Rise

**The Sun's Rise**

Today was just a normal evening for a young near eleven years old boy. He was currently fidgeting uncontrollably on his uncomfortable cot in the cupboard underneath the stairs as the normal nightmares plague his dreams. It's debatable whether the nightmares are just merely bad dreams created by his subconscious or memories of his times within the residence of his relatives.

Sometimes the boy thinks that it is a mixture of both or at least edited pieces of his past, like tonight's terrors where he relives his first few days of school with the good memories (like learning his name is Harry) to the average memories (the beatings at school from Dudley and his gang) to the horrible memories (like his punishment for giving his relatives the note from school telling them they needed to buy him glasses). The boy really had very few good memories let alone even possibly happy ones.

His life was one of a friendless boy being shadowed by strange and terrible events that he had no understanding of why they would occur. Terrorized; both night and day by either his 'family' or 'the dreams' (his dreams) nothing seemed to change. He did the same chores with new ones added in from time to time; he received the same cold treatment from those who should cherish him. The boy had many scars but only one that defined him differently than the others.

The boy was rather plain looking with messy black hair, and a rather pale skin tone, he was scrawny and small for his age. He basically swam in his hand me down large clothes nowhere near his size. On first glance the boy appeared ordinarily odd. But in truth he was quite strange. He has many secrets not even known to him. The boy was strange in all senses of the word but his story begins a new chapter. The rather smart and brave boy begins his new trials. The boy Harry Potter faces his new world as time passes on.

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><p>As the sun light streaks through the windows of the rather average house that was number Four Private Dr., the residence of the Dursleys' and the juvenile delinquent according to the neighborhood, the first signs of life within the house visible began. That is not to say though that this moment is the beginning of the story as it began an hour before.<p>

In the darkness that is young Harry Potter's living quarters the slumbering boy is suddenly awoken in a frigid sweat. 'Why me…?' Harry thinks as his soreness from the "chores" the previous day once again begin to act up like every other morning this entire summer. Images of the previous night's terrors he encountered easily reemerge into his conscious mind reconnecting with the first of many disappointments that were promises of happiness and change from his torture.

'Why would my parents leave me with them…?' Harry thinks as he remembers some of the treatment other orphaned children received in comparison to his.

'Why do they hate me…?' he wonders as no other word could describe the raw emotion held in his families eyes for as long as he can remember.

'What do they want from me…?' he remembers asking more times than he should rightfully need to within a life as it seems that all around him is an utter barrier of hatred and anguish with few acts of pity slowly breaking through the temporary cracks, which are repaired too quickly to ever possibly become anything else.

Harry takes what seems like hours to him just listening to heart beat in an attempt to put his night's revisits to the past behind him just like Mrs. Figgs suggested to him before, when he told her about his trouble with bad dream. She was his sole chance at survival in the Dursley's home as he would normally be sent to her home on Sundays or special occasions, to be honest her home smelt like cabbages and he still did chores for her but it was infinitely better there than at the Dursley's even when she had him go over all of her cat's photo albums.

Harry left his eyes closed as he did his best to follow her exercise seeing as the less distractions there were the easier it would be to complete. It might have only been a short term solution but it helped more than anything else did. He focused drowning out his sense of smell and touch as they were the only two to possibly pull him from his attempt at relief in his dark oblivion.

"Thomp… Thomp… Thomp… …" He hears from above as dust begins to fall settling on his skin mixing with his sweat to create a thin coat of mud. The sound confuses him seeing as it is a Saturday and those were not the dainty steps of his aunt. The steps are much louder than that and they are even louder than Dudley's powerful heavy stomps.

'Why is Uncle Vernon up already? He shouldn't be up for another two hours minimum, he likes sleeping in on the weekends. Aunt Petunia shouldn't even be up for another hour to supervise me cooking breakfast.' The steps dissipate from above him only to continue as a shuffling sound through the whole house being accompanied by random grunts and once or twice a rather loud "Bang".

'What is he up to?' Harry thinks as these sounds are foreign to him when coming from his uncle. The sounds were very familiar to him though as he had made them more times than he could count within the last week alone but it was nearly unheard of for the man to make these sounds within his home. His uncle was doing heavy manual labor or at least his equivalent of it. This does startle the young boy seeing as this is normally his job, but this is not the biggest thing to throw him off of his normal routine.

No, that comes from the footsteps of his Aunt which head directly to the kitchen not even missing a stride as only ten minutes later breakfast is beginning to cook. 'Ok, something is wrong here. They never forget to have me "earn my keep" so what's going on? Are they preparing to get rid of me and are just beginning to have my absence become normal to them?' He thinks knowing that he would not be able to stop them at this point. 'They have been having me do more work than normal this week and they did give me less water than last summer. Damn they planned this out spectacularly.'

Time passes on only adding to Harry's conclusion as he hears Vernon quietly curse. To Harry's honest annoyance Dudley hasn't awoken to the sounds of his parents. 'Dudley has always been a sound sleeper though, just another of his blessings.' As time passes the only sounds in the house are of the grease on the frying pan cooking, if he knows his aunt's pattern well enough, bacon the aroma is the one thing that will wake his cousin from his slumber without question in the morning.

Not a minute later "Thud… Thud… Thud…" is heard as his cousin comes down the steps proving his theory on the food correct. "Happy Birthday Dudikens!" is heard throughout the home being said by the mother.

'It's his birthday?' Harry thinks.

'Why am I here then? They always have me visit Mrs. Figgs… she must be unable to have me over today.' He thinks as conversation is passed around the table. Harry doesn't truly pay attention to it though as it makes no sense to him, he having never experienced a celebration like this before and probably never would.

Time goes on as the table is emptied and the Dursley's leave their home. The three of them don't even act as if another possibly exists within the house other than by one action right before the door to the house was finally locked.

Petunia made sure to lock the additional two locks to Harry's "room" as the family takes their leave from their home. 'Trapped yet again without any food or water' Harry thinks as he hears the car drive off. He instantly connects the irony from his thoughts to his normal day finding no difference.

'It's just another day in hell… I guess I won't get the small amount of pity I'm use to.' He feels tired and weak as the sounds of life outside his prison drift into his hell.

'If only I could know what's its like?' He ponders as his lack of liquids is being felt more intensely than before by his withered body. His bodies demands begin shifting pushing towards the slumber he fights as fear of what memories will surface in his dreams haunt his mind.

Solitude and isolation break him away from the world surrounding him aiding in his oppositions cause as his eyes begin to droop. His prison he wishes to escape is unyielding in tormenting him as his thoughts drift away from maintaining his relief from his only tormentor currently able to reach him.

He feels a burst of his energy needed to fight his currently enemy fade away right before he his slumber begins.

His wish is not granted.

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><p>Please do comment on the story as I find them very useful.<p>

I know this chapter is slow but it will pick up later.

No update yet just fixing up some errors I found and changed on my personal draft. It should make this easier to read.


	2. Dreams and Nightmares

**Dreams and Nightmares**

Harry's eyes are closed as a gentle breeze caresses his being. He begins to feel the soft earth support his form more thoroughly than his small cot ever had before. Beams of warmth slowly began to fall on the boys face asking him to awaken, a sensation never felt by him before. The world is tranquil and peaceful and gentle at least for the moment.

Harry opens his eyes seeing the clear blue sky above. No clouds blocking the suns warmth. Harry takes a breath of the clean fresh air as he gets up seeing the unfamiliar world around him. He stands in a small meadow like one would see in park. To his left is a forest covered in shadows but yet not foreboding in appearance. A rather large pond is visible in a distance to his right. Before him lies and unending plain in which the sun warms the comforting breeze that encompasses him. Harry looks behind him seeing gentle hills and ice capped mountains in the distance.

'Where am I?' He thinks seeing the natural beauty around him.

"Hello." A voice startles Harry as he turns to face its source coming from the woods. Harry sees a pale brunette boy wearing dark clothing in a similar state of disrepair as his own smiling at him near one of the trees.

'Could he be talking to someone else?' He thinks as he looks around seeing not another soul or place near.

The boy calls again "Do you want to play a game?" as he begins to move towards Harry while remaining in the shadows of the forests tree's. What little distance there was between the boys dissipates after a few seconds of travel by the unknown boy.

'What game?' he thinks remembering his cousin's favorite called Harry Hunting.

"Who are you? What game are you talking about?" Harry asks causing the other boy to smile in a like serpentine manor.

"Ah, how could I be so rude? My name is Tom, Tom Riddle. What is yours?"

"Harry."

The boy yet again smiles making Harry uncomfortable "the game I wanted to play is called chess. It's a strategy game in which the goal is to capture the king. There are many pieces each with their own set of possible moves. The game has many players and forms having been passed down for many ages from teacher to student."

This catches Harry's interest as the many people involved in this game could possibly become friends with him. He didn't have any himself but now that he was clearly away from his prison he could finally make some for himself. "That sounds interesting but where would we find a set?"

Tom smirks a serpentine like smile as he points to a table and chairs at the edge of the forest. "Why the set my teacher and I last used is right over there. You can use his pieces." Tom leads Harry over to the table never once leaving the shadows of the forest. He leads Harry to sit in the chair partially encompassed in the sun's light. Harry takes a seat before looking at the hundreds of pieces before him.

"How do you play with all these pieces?" Harry asks seeing mainly human like figurines on his side.

"Well you see the last game played with this set was a much more complex version of chess against my teacher. He was a master of the game having already faced one of the greatest players of all before and having watched matches against two other players of such shear greatness. I was caught in a rather brilliant or unlucky trap which ended our last match in his victory. I do hope to play against him again one day." Tom finishes looking directly at Harry who was just imagining the level of difficulty and time the game played must have taken.

"Do you think I could watch the next time you play against him?" Harry asked intrigued at the possible person of interest to his hopefully soon to be friend.

Tom smiles [his becoming uncomfortable to Harry smile] "Sure, although I can't guarantee you would be able to watch the whole match things come up you know and the game is quiet long normally." Tom then takes many black robed pieces and places them on his side of an eight by eight checker board some weird creatures were on his back row of his setup.

Harry just stares in confusion as Tom lines his pieces up only using sixteen of his many figurines.

Tom looks up at him seeing the desolate board across from him before seemingly realizing his mistake of not having told Harry about his pieces yet. "I almost forgot this is your first time playing. Well the pieces each have their properties."

He then grabs a male figuring which looked similar to Harry. "These pieces are you pawns." He says placing the, for some reason stick wielding, piece on the board. He grabs a few others including a red headed female piece which he places next to the male piece on the later learned to be queen's side of the board. "They are mainly meant to be sacrifices to protect your more powerful pieces. But if they reach the other side of the board can become much stronger."

He then introduces all of Harry's pieces like the crib like knights, two billowing robed bishops, two castle shaped rooks, A phoenix for a queen and the king piece of a sagely old man that Tom introduced to Harry as the Phoenix King in comparison to his Serpent King.

Tom then begins to play against Harry teaching him some tricks and strategies as time goes on, just like his teacher taught him.

Tom had just won his fourth game in a row when he stood up. "I'm sorry Harry but I need to leave now."

This confuses the boy "How come Tom?"

"Well I have another friend that I was planning on watching a movie with and it's almost time for that engagement."

This disappoints Harry. "Oh, could I come too?"

Tom shakes his head. "Sorry but my friend is rather shy, maybe next time." Tom then gets up and waves to Harry as he walks farther into the dark forest.

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><p>"AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Harry yells as he awakes from his dre… no nightmare, even by his standards.<p>

It is early Monday morning about four if his biological clock is right. For the second time in two days he had now had very intense dreams during his slumber. Thankfully for him the Dursley's had not been home for the previous wakeup call after he awoke from the dream after his game with Tom. That dream matched the intensity of only his most horrid nightmare prior to the one he just experienced.

The Dursley's had been out the entire day on Sunday having not come home from the zoo Saturday due to some freak accident with the water hydrants around the neighborhood. They had stayed in a hotel for the night as small floods had blocked off the main road back for a few hours due to the lever or something used to cut off the line failing.

This early morning though he is not safe from the punishment, not that he cared at this point as the plaguing nightmare was still too fresh in his mind.

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><p><em>This nightmare was nothing like his previous one though as it couldn't have happened. He was taller in the dream than he is in reality. But that was only the first of the many discrepancies between reality and the dream.<em>

_It started with him heading towards a house in a small village at the dead of night. He was happy and joyful at the ideas of what he was planning on doing._

_[Not that Harry could think about what it was he, in the dream, was planning.]_

_He reached the door finding it locked but a quick look at it and a point with a stick and it was unlocked in less than a second. He walked into the living room looking for something, but he couldn't think of what it was he was yearning to find. _

_Harry though got the answer to his astonishment moments later as he saw a young innocent girl no older than four curling up with her teddy bear. He felt revolted at the very image before his eyes for a reason Harry could not comprehend. _

_The next thing Harry knew his right arm was moving in a manner unfamiliar to him but after a moment he was pointing at the little girl with the stick he noticed earlier. __He was completely furious at the girl in her innocent slumber; he was nearly burning in fury as he watched a sickly reddish orange [for lack of a better word] beam sailed over to the unsuspecting child. When the light finally reached her he was happily watching her suffer unending pain._

_He laughed as she called out for her family begging for the pain to stop for what seemed like an eternity._

_When the beam finally ended the girl was twitching fear easily seen in her eyes as they connected with his. He basked in that fear loving it so much that he stayed watching her stare at him no movement seen being done by her form for a minute more._

_But there were others to find so he left to find them promising to come back to let her have her end._

_He found the mother and brother in their respected rooms and lead them both seemingly unknowing of the world around them to the girls room for more fun. It was hours of brutal torture to the family that he inflicted having each of their lives end in their own special way._

_The mother was skinned alive by her son right above her seemingly frozen daughter. Mother and daughter looked each other in the eyes as blood poured over blood with silent please for mercy being ignored. The daughter looked directly into her mother's eyes as she died._

_Not a sound was made._

_He gave the boy a quick death being bathed in green light for a moment._

_All that was left was the girl pleading with her eyes to be graced with the quick end her brother was granted. He smiles as he points at the floor where a small fire starts._

_He laughs as he closes the door his eyes locked on the girls. "Good Night" is the last thing said as he leaves the home with pure joy flowing throughout his being._

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><p>Now though the once intoxicating images are to Harry a sickening, and disgusting nightmare which at the same time makes him afraid of their very existence as only the wickedest of people could ever enjoy the scenes his mind produced.<p>

'It's not real… It can't be.' Harry thinks before he hears the partially welcomed stomps of his enraged uncle.

Harry knows what's coming as it has happened many times before but with his lack of sustenance and hydration the weak adhesive of his muddy sweat and waste is enough to hold him down unable to act as he hears the locks to his bleak cell release.

'I'm dead now.' He thinks as the phantom pains felt by the girl in the dream begins to haunt him again.

Mr. Vernon quickly opens the door to the dark cupboard as his rage is quickly overtaking any mind. He sees his weakened and, even normally, rather pathetic nephew hold the now normal resignation to receiving what he has decided his punishment to be.

It only further infuriated the walrus like man seeing this.

He quickly yanks Harry out of the cupboard under the stairs with as much force as he can taking him to the garage once again noticing that Harry isn't fighting back against his tight grip. As they enter into the soundproof garage he feels his grip on Harry's arm tighten more before he throws Harry to the ground.

"You know we were going to wait until later to punish you for what you did to the fire hydrants a few days ago but you just had to go and wake up the whole house for your own sick enjoyment freak. Now you will get what your kind deserves you lousy no good monstrosity." Vernon yells after the door is closed.

He walks towards his nephew grabbing him by the collar of his shirt to make him rise before striking him with a powerful punch directly into the boy's gut. If Harry had anything other than acid in his stomach then he would have just regurgitated it then by the sheer force of the punch. Vernon then strikes Harry all over his body with heavy focus on his ribs and face.

"Had enough yet freak!" He yells looking into Harry's eyes seeing determination like always to not bow.

"Let's keep going then." He states evenly wishing to have seen the boy give in and declare him superior to the boy's freakish way begging to be normal like him and his family. He would have only earned twenty lashes for his misbehavior then.

Harry is in pain although he is doing his best to submerge it just so Vernon doesn't win this round.

He doesn't know why the Dursley's hate him but he knows from experience that giving in doesn't end his pain and suffering in this prison.

He knows he will never be seen as an equal by them, only a slave to do their bidding until they feel they no longer need him.

He contemplated dying before as to be relieved of this eternal agony but he then found a taste of the world he would love to live in on the first day of school.

There was more than pain, hatred, and agony in this world. It gave him hope of one day escaping and experiencing life as they call it where along with the bad are specks of good. There is happiness, friendship, and affection. Things he felt only little of his entire existence.

He is helpless when Vernon pulls his shirt over his head showing his marred back. He can do nothing as he is shoved face first against the wall. He prepares himself for the pain he knows will come, stopping his screams as the belt once again ripped into his back.

'This will end in a tie, I will not lose!' Harry thinks as the next of many strikes hits his spine.

'I will not lose!' he repeats throughout the entire experience feeling some blood run down his back towards the end of the session. Vernon kicks the back of his kneecaps having him fall to the ground his glasses falling from his face to the ground besides him. His entire body aches so much as he hears Vernon leave the room for now.

Harry knows he will be back to inflict more punishment on him due to the car being outside but smiles at the fact that he didn't lose.

"I Will Escape This Prison." He whispers as a drop of water from the leaky pipe hits his cheek.

"I Will The War."

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><p>Please review they help me write these chapters.<p>

Again No update yet just fixing some mistakes and making it easier to read the sections overall.


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